If we indispensable a accessible illustration of a cove in tender peculiarity between Belgium and a United States, demeanour no serve than any side’s particular substitutions during striker. With a US underneath encircle and sticking desperately to a 0-0 scoreline that would get them to additional time, Jurgen Klinsmann brought on Chris Wondolowski — a 31-year-old MLS maestro who’s spent his whole pro career in a United States and grown a repute as a vicious poacher in front of goal. The usually problem is that, superb as he’s been in MLS, he hasn’t grown a repute for most else during any other level.

Meanwhile, during a start of that additional time, Belgium brought on Romelu Lukaku. A 21-year-old powerhouse with speed, touch, and no necessity of beast force, Lukaku led Everton in scoring this past deteriorate while on loan from Chelsea — and substantially lifting his value on a send marketplace above a infancy of a US’s whole starting 11 combined.

In many ways, a US — as it has so many times in a soccer story — defied that cove in tender quality. The Yanks ran as distant as it was probable to run, tackled as tough as it was to tackle, fought as tough as it was to fight. Tim Howard put together a opening that competence have been deliberate unfit if we hadn’t already seen it once from a US goalkeeper, when Kasey Keller befuddled Brazil in 1998. With their backs as distant opposite a wall as it was probable to be, a US brought on a teen who scored a idea with his initial touch. If we can’t take some honour what a US showed in that final 15 minutes, well, we substantially base for some other team.

But sometimes, there’s usually so most defying that can be done. Wondolowski couldn’t measure from 6 yards. Lukaku scored one idea and set adult another. So it goes.

CBSSports.com’s actor ratings for a match:

STARTING 11

GK Tim Howard, 10, MAN OF THE MATCH. I mean, if that wasn’t a ideal 10 performance, what is? That Howard done some-more saves than any World Cup goalkeeper in 50 years goes some approach to describing his performance; that he somehow managed to make all those saves yet permitting a singular dangerous miscarry maybe goes a rest of a way. He was zero brief of legendary.

RB Fabian Johnson, 5. Johnson was usually on a margin for 32 mins before carrying to come off with nonetheless another hamstring problem, a third time in usually 4 games an American has had to leave before a second half over a hamstring injury. He won’t like it, yet Jurgen Klinsmann will have to answer questions as to why.

CB Omar Gonzalez, 7. Hey, remember behind when Gonzalez was ostensible to be terrible? Two games ago, remember that? Gonzalez deserves as most credit as it’s probable to give him for holding his benching for Geoff Cameron in walk — and afterwards entrance off that dais to turn a best non-Howard actor on a organisation opposite a Germany and Belgium games.

LB Damarcus Beasley, 8. Hey, remember behind when Damarcus Beasley was going to be a defensive liability, before this contest started? Beasley was a US’s best defender on a night, time and time again snuffing out Belgian attacks along his left wing before hastily brazen — he was some-more concerned with a offense than during any time in a contest — and even sketch a few pressure-releasing fouls. Tremendous.

DM Geoff Cameron, 5. Cameron started good after changeable brazen from his common executive defensive position, yet wilted in a second half as Belgium poured brazen and did small — possibly by positioning, in a tackle, or in possession — to stop a bleeding. To be fair, though, with Jermaine Jones and Michael Bradley pulling serve brazen (and a US’s wing midfielders not charity most in support), he didn’t have a lot of assistance in a core of a field.

CM Michael Bradley, 6. Bradley never did recover his common hold on a ball, or ever uncover a form approaching of him when a World Cup began. But some-more than any other US player, it was his omnivorous expostulate and work rate — oh, and his torpedo turn to find Julian Green — that powered a US’s additional time fightback. When we speak about American soccer players, Bradley is what we speak about — all a guts, all a effort, and clearly adequate ability to be legitimately dangerous … without, in this tournament, quite being means to strap that ability to limit effect.

DM Jermaine Jones, 5. Jones flew serve brazen into a conflict than he had in any prior US game, withdrawal Cameron and Bradley to try and stop a Belgian advances. Occasionally it paid off with a dangerous-looking shot or a crafty pass. But some-more often, it seems to have simply paid off in Jones carrying reduction of an impact than in any prior compare in this tournament.

LM Alejandro Bedoya, 4. Bedoya, as always, worked and worked hard on a defensive end, and done some-more than one timely involvement on a left side in front of Beasley. But as it has been via a tournament, he constructed changed small in a approach of offense and couldn’t assistance solve a US’s crippling problems in possession, either. He wasn’t poor, yet there’s small doubt a US indispensable some-more out of him.

RM Graham Zusi, 4. There was a time in World Cup subordinate when it looked like Zusi was Landon Donovan’s successor apparent to a purpose of “cutting, industrious two-way far-reaching midfielder,” even if he wasn’t utterly as gentle tucking inside as Donovan was (and was more comfortable delivering crosses into a box). It didn’t manifest during this World Cup, as Zusi never seemed gentle on a ball, and opposite Belgium committed both a handful of bad giveaways and could not do most with his handful of touches inside a box.

F Clint Dempsey, 5. It’s over unpleasant to cruise that that might good have been Clint Dempsey’s final World Cup compare for a US Men’s National Team — and that it finished with Dempsey incompetent to top a US’s brilliantly worked giveaway flog slight with a idea that would have left down in World Cup lore. Dempsey fought his behind finish off, wasn’t to censure for his miss of service, and put a US in a turn of 16 position in a initial place with his organisation theatre scores. But he indispensable to be only a hair crook Tuesday night in Salvador.

SUBSTITUTES

RB DeAndre Yedlin, 7. Basically everything the US did in conflict in regulation, it did by Yedlin’s bombing runs down a right-hand side. After 3 plain surrogate performances in a World Cup, a US seems staid to block Johnson in during left behind and Yedlin during right behind and have those positions solved for a subsequent 10 years.

F Chris Wondolowski, 4. Maybe he would have been ruled offsides. Maybe he wouldn’t have been. Either way: Wondolowski had a kind of event he was brought onto a register to modify — a late-game, poacher’s chance, tighten to goal, World Cup presence on a line. He didn’t convert.

LM Julian Green, 7. An glorious run and just-as-excellently taken idea for a German-American teen — one that singlehandedly fit Jurgen Klinsmann’s daring assurances that Green could minister during this World Cup and wasn’t only along for a float in credentials for 2018.